Broken Hill midwives celebrate as defenders of women's rights
The Broken Hill Maternity Unit is celebrating International Day of the Midwife (5 May 2019) while promoting their role as advocates and defenders of women's rights to have access to a known Midwife.
Midwives, women, girls, partners and supporters of midwives and midwifery globally come together to celebrate International Day of the Midwife on 5 May each year.
'International Midwives Day (IMD) is important to the Midwifery profession as it's a day for us to increase community awareness of midwifery services, increase the coverage of midwifery issues in the media, nourish the support system among midwives and celebrate the hard work we do for our community,' said Thea de Lore, Acting Midwifery Unit Manager.
The theme of IMD this year is 'Midwives: Defenders of Women's Rights'. This aims to highlight the vital role that midwives play in protecting the rights of women, girls and midwives by ensuring they can exercise their full human rights, particularly their reproductive and sexual health rights in their communities and countries of practice.
'In line with this year's theme of IMD, the Midwives see themselves as advocates for and defenders of the women's rights in Broken Hill to have access to a known Midwife,' said Thea.
IMD is on 5 May 2019 but the Maternity Unit is celebrating IMD earlier, on 2 May. This is to coincide with a team-building workshop designed to welcome new staff and help re-define the Unit's goals for the next year. There will also be a celebratory cake for staff.
'In 2019 we have had the largest overhaul of the Midwifery Group Practice since we launched the service in 2015 and our team building workshop is designed to bring the staff together to create a shared identity and clear goals for the future,' said Thea. 'We will be looking at our individual personalities, making a staff photo board, designing a new uniform and defining our Core Values as NSW Health employees.'
She said the Broken Hill Midwifery Group Practice will continue to grow and thrive. It has welcomed a number of new staff from across the states this year who have bought a wonderful new energy and many great ideas. 'The Midwives work exceptionally hard to keep this service the best it can be for the community and will continually work to evolve the service to meet the needs of the women and their families.'